


Dead Man Walking

by Suzie_Shooter



Category: Alex Rider (TV 2020), Alex Rider - Anthony Horowitz
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Assassination, Bathing/Washing, Caretaking, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Flashbacks, Fluff and Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Injury Recovery, Kissing, M/M, Sex, Whump
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-19
Updated: 2020-07-19
Packaged: 2021-03-05 01:27:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 16,921
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25386034
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Suzie_Shooter/pseuds/Suzie_Shooter
Summary: Alex is 19 and working as a full-time operative for MI6 when during the course of a mission he discovers Yassen Gregorovich being held as a prisoner by a rival organisation. He's been tortured and is in a bad way, both physically and mentally. Alex decides to hide him away and look after him himself, but this means not only dealing with his own evolving feelings for the man but running the risk of stark consequences from the people who want to know where Yassen has gone.
Relationships: Yassen Gregorovich/Alex Rider
Comments: 22
Kudos: 160





	1. Chapter 1

There were autumn leaves falling over his face. 

That was how it felt. Dry leaves drifting down out of a bright sky, brushing across his face like moth wings.

He was no longer sure if his eyes were open, but the light was always there. 

It was his sense of time that had gone first. They had ways, here, of ensuring that. 

Familiarity with the methods made them no easier to experience.

There were ways to resist torture. The pain was sometimes the easiest thing to ignore. You let out a little information at a time, sometimes true, sometimes not. Sometimes relevant, more often not. Extend the period they needed you. Survive long enough to escape, or for rescue.

He'd accepted, with no tangible sense of emotion, that he no longer expected either. There was nothing left he could tell them. He would die here.

And yet, acceptance of his fate hadn’t meant total surrender. Still he held one thing stubbornly inside, the one memory they couldn’t take from him. Shattered as he was, they couldn’t pick it out from the pieces, because they didn't know it was there. Didn’t know to ask.

The light made his eyes water, but he couldn't close them because he believed they were already shut.

There were fewer leaves falling, now. Somehow he knew, when the leaves had all fallen, then it would be over. The breeze over his face would blow away all that was left of him.

Distantly, a sound like a gunshot. The tree, he thought. The tree is falling.

There were no leaves, now. Only empty sky.

–

He was the last person Alex had expected to find in that place. Mostly due to the fact he had every reason to think Yassen Gregorovich had died five years earlier. 

Neither did he recognise him at first, the naked, unshaven figure curled in on himself in the third cell he looked into on his sweep of the building. His team had infiltrated a facility operated by the cabal known as Sacre Coeur for the specific purpose of recovering a certain data file, which meant getting in and out as fast and as cleanly as possible. So he spared the pathetic looking prisoner no more than a glance of pity and was about to move on when some sixth sense tugged at him and he looked again.

And saw.

The lock took him barely a minute but once inside he hesitated, afraid, suddenly, that the man lying with his eyes open and unblinking on the hard bench was dead already. But no, as Alex watched, he detected the tiniest rise and fall of his chest. He looked round quickly, knowing he was already wasting time here, and knelt in front of him.

"Yassen?" Looking down into the face he'd never thought to see again other than in dreams.

There was no response, not so much as a blink. This close, Alex could see the bruises covering his body, the weals and burns and marks, some fresh, some faded. He wondered with contained horror just how long Yassen had been here like this. And whether there was anything left of him.

"Yassen. It's me. Alex." The words seemed inadequate, but there was finally a flickering of something in the frightening empty eyes that might have been recognition.

"Fuck's sake, wake up!" Alex pleaded in mounting desperation. Time was running out, he would have to leave him. There were noises in the corridor and he looked behind him, fingering his gun nervously. No way of telling if it was his own people out there or not.

"Alex?" 

Barely a breath, a broken sigh over dry lips, but it snapped Alex's attention back and a wild hope that he hardly recognised as such hammered in his chest.

"Yes! Can you walk? We have to get out of here."

Frantic to get moving, Alex groaned in desperation as Yassen merely smiled faintly.

"I wish you were really here." Almost dreamily distant.

"I am you idiot." Alex ducked his head until he was in Yassen's eyeline and slapped him across the cheek. "Now get with it or I’m leaving you behind."

A deeper shade of animation seeped back into Yassen's eyes and his vague smile turned into a grimace as the struggle to summon concentration brought the pain back with it.

"Alex?" Stronger this time, and faintly puzzled.

"Yes!" Exasperated and scared, Alex clutched at the recognition in his voice. 

Wincing with the effort, Yassen dragged himself to a position where he was propped on one arm and looked at him properly for the first time. 

"Alex."

"Is that the extent of your vocabulary now?" Alex scrambled to his feet and held out his hand. "Coming?"

Yassen hung his head briefly as a fresh wave of pain coursed through his body and he gritted his teeth. "I don’t think I can walk." 

Alex made a noise of frustration and reached down, steeling himself not to flinch from the obvious extra pain his touch was causing.

With no time to find anything to cover him with, Alex half supported and half dragged Yassen out of the cell and down the corridor. With a flight of stairs to negotiate and another long corridor, Alex later had no memory of how he'd managed. Semi-conscious, Yassen had helped where he could, but the extent of that was mostly taken up in not being an entirely dead weight against Alex. 

They hit the cold night air and Alex shot a worried glance at the Russian's naked frame, but Yassen didn’t even appear to notice. Feeling that was possibly an even worse sign, Alex filed it away to worry about later and concentrated on manhandling him into the back of the car he'd arrived in. He knew he was fucking up badly by walking out on the rest of his team, knew he'd be in the shit later. But he trusted them to manage without him, whereas somehow his entire being had concentrated itself in the need to get Yassen out of this place, and without anyone seeing.

He practically shoved Yassen onto the back seat where he crouched in a cold sweat of pain. Alex threw himself into the driver’s seat, conscious that behind him Yassen was retching weakly, pain-wracked to the point of nausea, but with nothing left to lose. 

Alex slammed the car into gear and drove through the night.

Yassen was unconscious for most of the journey and Alex felt this was probably a blessing as the car rattled through the Paris suburbs towards their destination. He dragged him into his apartment building and up in a lift that was - thank God - working. 

"You should leave me. They will come after," Yassen muttered in a brief moment of lucidity as Alex fumbled with the key. Alex pushed him in through the door and slammed and locked it firmly behind them.

–

When Yassen opened his eyes, he expected to see only his cell, too used to dreams giving him false hope of escape. 

What he saw was Alex sitting with his back against the opposite wall, legs out in front of him on the cheap carpet, gun on the floor within reach but not in his grasp.

Alex looked up and realised he was awake. For a second they stared at each other without speaking.

"Did you bring me here to kill me?" Yassen's voice was an abused whisper, devoid of inflection.

Alex looked down at the gun, and frowned. "You said we might be followed." He left the gun where it was and crawled across to the mattress. 

"Here. Drink this." He offered him a glass of water, supported it as Yassen managed a couple of sips before slumping back.

"Why?" he asked, and the only strength in his body seemed to be in his eyes, holding Alex in his gaze.

Alex looked at a loss. "I couldn't leave you in there." 

"You could have shot me. Put me out of my misery. Why this?"

"Who says I could have shot you? I'm not you, Yassen," Alex shot back, stung. He looked like he was trying hard not to cry. "I don't know what to do," he added in a whisper, but Yassen had passed out again.

–

When Yassen woke the next time he was disoriented and didn’t seem to know where he was, mumbling and then shouting hoarsely at Alex in Russian as he tried to climb off the mattress on legs that wouldn’t hold him up.

In his weakened state it was less difficult than Alex had feared to convince him to lie down again, all the while trying to reassure him that everything was alright and not at all sure that Yassen understood a word he was saying. Yassen stared up at him with no recognition in his eyes, still brokenly muttering something. Alex only knew a few words of Russian but he was fairly sure one Yassen kept repeating was _please_.

“It’s alright,” he told him, stroking his matted hair. “It’s alright. You’re safe. You’re safe.” 

Yassen’s eyes were wide and wary but also exhausted and before long he’d passed out again, worn out by his brief burst of energy. 

Alex settled back to watching over him, biting his fingernails. If Yassen was so far gone he no longer recognised him he had a problem, especially once he got his strength back. Yassen at the best of times was deadly, a Yassen who was feeling threatened, scared and disorientated would be terrifying at full capacity. Alex clung to the fact that he’d known who he was before, that there was still hope.

–

Next time Yassen came round Alex studied him warily for signs of trouble. Yassen though just studied him back, as if working something through in his head. When he moved, Alex tensed, but it was only to pull himself painfully into a sitting position on the mattress, back braced against the wall. 

Apart from the bedclothes Yassen was still naked. Alex hadn’t liked to touch him while he was still unconscious, even to try and clean off some of the blood and dirt he was caked with. 

“Alex.” 

Alex breathed a sigh of relief that Yassen appeared to have recovered his mental state enough to at least recognise him. He thought again how hoarse he sounded. He’d initially assumed it was because Yassen was dehydrated but the thought occurred to him now it might have been from prolonged shouting. 

Or screaming. 

None of his injuries looked that major but Alex knew full well how much pain could be inflicted without leaving a single mark. He shivered.

“Hey. How do you feel?”

Yassen just looked at him, and didn’t dignify that with a response. “Where are we?” he asked instead. 

“Safe.” Alex wondered how long that would hold true for. People would be looking for both of them, although nobody knew about this apartment. “Paris.”

Yassen nodded slowly, the movement looking like it pained him. 

“Would you like a bath?” Alex offered, at a loss for something to say but also thinking how uncomfortable it must feel to be that filthy. “There isn’t a shower here. But I could run a bath?”

“Thank you. That would be – kind.” Yassen measured each word carefully, as if it cost him an effort to speak, and he was having to concentrate. There was also a wariness in his eyes still, that suggested he didn’t quite believe he was free or safe, or that he trusted Alex. Alex wondered if he thought all this was just part of a set-up, made to make him think he was free before crushing him again.

Alex looked back from the doorway. “You’re safe here,” he said again, wanting Yassen to hear it even if he didn’t believe it. “Nobody knows where you are. Not MI6 either.” 

Yassen didn’t reply, but there was still that watchfulness in his eyes, weighing everything he saw and heard. Alex hoped he could sense he was telling the truth.

As he went to fill the large old fashioned ceramic bath he reflected on the fact that what he’d said was all too true. He hadn’t checked in with MI6 since deserting his team mid-mission, and they would presumably be doing their collective nut wondering what had happened to him. He would have to make contact before long, if only to stop them looking. As long as he didn’t turn his phone on until he was away from the flat he should be fine, he didn’t think they had any reason to be tracking him. Although after this they might, especially if they found out what he was up to.

Alex sat on the side of the tub and stared at his reflection in the mirror as it gradually fogged over. What _was_ he doing? He was harbouring a dangerous and wanted criminal. He had abandoned a critical mission, failed to check in at an appointed time, and was withholding important information from his employers. At best they would fire him. At worst – well he didn’t want to think about that. 

When he’d found Yassen he’d acted purely on instinct. He could probably explain that away, if he contacted them now, made a clean breast of everything. Alex sighed, checked for the hundredth time that his phone was safely turned off, and went back to tell Yassen his bath was ready.

He’d been half afraid that as soon as he was out of sight Yassen would do a runner, but to Alex’s relief he was still where he’d left him. He’d pushed back the covers and had apparently been examining his injuries. Alex wondered how many of them he was seeing clearly for the first time. 

“Let’s get you clean,” he said. “And I’ve got antiseptic cream and stuff. And you need to eat something.” Seeing now the covers were off exactly how emaciated he looked. “Several somethings.”

Yassen tried to rise, then hung his head when his legs failed him. “I’m not sure I can,” he admitted through what sounded like gritted teeth, and Alex realised with surprise that he was embarrassed. 

“Here. Lean on me.” Alex steeled himself to be practical and came forward to help him up.

Alex helped him to the bath with some difficulty, then hovered at the side wondering if he should leave or if there was a danger of him passing out again. He’d never seen Yassen this weak, never imagined him this vulnerable. It felt wrong somehow, like the world was off-kilter. 

Yassen lowered himself gingerly into the water with a pained hiss.

"Okay?" Alex asked anxiously. "Is it too hot?"

"No, it's fine." Yassen gave him a tight smile. "Just stings." He sank lower into the water, bracing his arms on the sides. "Talk about death of a thousand cuts."

"What the hell did they do to you?" Alex couldn't help his eyes wandering over Yassen's abused body. There were older scars too, that told of earlier troubles. Alex thought of his own ravaged back with a pang of sympathy.

"Everything they could think of." Yassen closed his eyes, expression still tight but Alex thought there was some relief there as well now. "Including some I rather wish they hadn't."

His words were light enough, but Alex thought again of what might have made his voice that hoarse and for a second closed his own eyes too.

"Should I leave you in peace?" Alex asked. "Or would you rather I stayed?"

Yassen looked up at him then, and shrugged slightly. "I don't mind." 

Alex, who would have hated being stared at whilst naked and vulnerable had a moment of envy for Yassen's apparently genuine disregard, then thought well, I should probably also stop staring. 

Yassen carefully slipped further under the water until it was up to his neck, then almost gave Alex a heart attack by sliding right under. He stayed beneath the surface for so long Alex was about to grab him by the hair in the sudden conviction he was trying to drown himself, but then he finally came up again, and Alex found he was breathing harder than Yassen was.

Having taken a moment to simply savour the feeling of the clean water on his skin, Yassen started washing off the ingrained dirt, but the heat and the effort made him dizzy and he had to stop again.

"Are you alright?" Alex asked, seeing him leaning weakly against the side. 

"This is ridiculous," Yassen sighed. "I can hardly move."

"Here. Let me." Before he'd really thought about what he was doing Alex had taken the flannel from him, dipped it in the water and reached out.

Yassen instinctively caught his wrist, staring at him with a fuzzily startled expression. Alex was about to apologise, belatedly realising with shock that of course Yassen wouldn't want to be touched so intimately, when Yassen cautiously let go again, withdrawing his hand and giving Alex a wary nod.

"Sure?" Alex checked, then started gently washing his shoulders and back. There were so many injuries that he knew he must be causing him pain but there was no way to avoid it. For one thing they needed to be cleaned, or there was surely a danger of infection. 

He went as gently as he could, slowly and patiently washing away the blood and sweat and filth. Yassen was painfully thin, Alex could feel the bones beneath his fingers and the skin itself was ridged in places with scar tissue. As Alex’s fingers trailed over one raised patch to the side of his spine he thought again of his own scars, of the trauma that came not just from acquiring them, but afterwards, every time you remembered they were there.

For his part Yassen made no sound at all, just let Alex continue working his way thoroughly down his body. Arms, back, then his legs, so Yassen didn't have to bend over. The area in between Alex was trying not to look at let alone accidentally touch, but eventually everywhere else was clean and he sat back, twisting the cloth between his hands. 

"So, um." 

"I can probably take over from here," Yassen said carefully. "If you'd rather not finish the job."

Alex looked up sharply, suddenly realising Yassen was inwardly laughing at him. He broke into a helpless grin.

"To be fair, you probably don't want me washing your bits anyway."

"Not the worst thing that's been done to them lately." Yassen took the cloth back and started scrubbing himself a lot harder than Alex had. Alex was so startled by this aspect of torture he hadn't even considered, that he completely forgot to look away again.

"How long were you in there?" he asked eventually, needing to break the silence with something other then the sound of Yassen soaping his balls.

Yassen stopped what he was doing and looked at him blankly. "Do you know, I actually have no idea. What's the date?"

"June the twentieth." Alex hesitated, thrown by Yassen's expression. "2019?" he added.

"Shit." Yassen said it quietly, and to Alex it sounded somehow devastating. 

"How long?" he whispered.

Yassen picked up the flannel, started mechanically washing again. Alex reached down and drew it out of his hand. 

"How long, Yassen?"

Yassen reluctantly met his eyes. "Almost a whole year," he said, sounding like he didn't believe it himself. Didn't want to believe it. "It was August."

"Christ."

"Yeah." 

Alex found himself looking at the network of scars on Yassen's body again, wondering how many of the ones he'd thought were pre-existing were from his captivity.

"Are you okay?" Alex felt it was inadequate as questions went, knowing the answer could only be no. But wanting, needing to say something.

Yassen took a while before answering. "I'm alive," he said finally. "So on balance, you could say I'm doing better than I expected."

"Yassen - "

"Leave it. It's fine." 

"It's not fine."

"No. But then what can you do about it?" Yassen demanded, with a sudden flare of temper that took Alex by surprise.

"I - " Alex stuttered, but Yassen was already hanging his head. 

"I'm sorry. I - ignore me."

"It's okay." Alex tentatively reached out and laid a hand on his shoulder. "Like you say, you're alive. It's a good start."

Yassen looked up at him, his eyes searching. "Why do you care? I don't mean that the way it sounds, I just - don't understand why you wouldn't have left me there. After everything I've done."

"Maybe enough people in my life have died already," Alex said. "Maybe I don't want to lose any more. And maybe I saw that whatever else you did, you did genuinely try to help me. And maybe if I'd seen that earlier..." he tailed off, and Yassen smiled despite himself.

"That's a lot of maybes."

"Welcome to my life."

Yassen buried his hands in his matted hair and tugged at it disgustedly. "I need to do something with this."

"I'd suggest a match, but it's a bit wet," Alex said without thinking, and then could have bitten his tongue off, because how many of those marks on Yassen's body were burns? But Yassen just gave him an amused look, and conceded the point with a tilt of the head. 

"Scissors, possibly." Yassen scratched at his growth of beard. "Do you have a razor?"

"Yes." Alex got up to fetch it, set it on the side of the bath. "Do you need a hand getting out?"

"Sadly I think I will."

Alex smiled. "I won't tell if you won't." 

He helped Yassen clamber out again and gave him a towel. "Did you want me to - " he gestured at the razor.

"No, thank you. I can manage."

Alex nodded. Yassen might be fine with somebody washing him, but holding a blade to his throat was probably a step too far. It was fair enough. He made for the door, then hesitated. "Maybe I should still stay though?"

"I'm only going to shave, I promise," Yassen said drily, guessing the direction of his thoughts. "If I was going to kill myself there are more efficient methods."

Alex winced, both at the thought and that he'd been so transparent. He nodded and left, going to change the sheets Yassen had been sleeping in that were soiled from just being next to his body, and to find some clothes for him. Fortunately he figured his own would fit him, Yassen wasn't a large man and right now he was a shadow of his former self.

Alex knocked on the door to the bathroom, wondering why he was being so shy now given that a few minutes ago he'd been washing the man.

"I've left some clothes here," he called. "I need to go out for a bit. Will you be okay?"

"I imagine I'll cope," came the reply, and Alex grinned. 

"Try not to pass out, huh." 

He slipped out of the apartment and got into the car. He needed to move it somewhere further from the apartment, should have done it before but hadn't dared leave Yassen in his earlier state. He bought food and clothes and toiletries for Yassen, not knowing how quickly the man would insist on leaving, but knowing he'd need the basics.

He fingered the mobile phone in his pocket. He should check in. If he didn't do it now, at a safe distance, it became more of an issue. The longer he left it, the worse the repercussions would be. And yet - he knew they'd come for him, knew they'd insist on hearing what had happened. And he didn't have answers. He needed more time, needed to think it through. 

Alex headed back on foot, phone stubbornly still switched off.

When he got back it was to discover that Yassen had not only shaved off his beard but also all of his hair.

"Strong look." 

Yassen looked mildly embarrassed. "I got cross with it." 

"Suppose I should just be glad you didn't shoot it." Alex realised with a jolt he'd left his gun in the flat. Just how disjointedly was he thinking? He looked for it straight away, found it on the table, also knew that wasn't where he'd left it. 

Went to pick it up, checked it over, tucked it into his waistband. He could have walked in to a bullet coming the other way. He could have walked in to find Yassen had taken advantage of a _more efficient method_. But then, he hadn't. When had he started trusting Yassen so much, he wondered? And how dangerous was it to assume he could? 

“I brought food,” Alex told him. “We should eat.” He’d realised while he was out how ravenous he was himself, and had brought a variety of tempting things out of a suspicion that Yassen might find even the thought of eating difficult after what he’d been through. They’d obviously given him enough to keep him alive, but only just, and Alex doubted it had been anything very nice.

Yassen watched with a growing fascination as Alex set out an unexpectedly large number of things on the table.

“I didn’t know what you liked,” Alex explained somewhat defensively, conscious of Yassen’s eyes on him. 

“So you bought everything?”

“Shut up and eat.” 

Yassen picked out a few things, but Alex noticed he wasn’t eating them, just moving them around the plate.

“Would you prefer something else?”

Yassen glanced up. “Sorry. I just...” He looked away again. “It’s all amazing, I just...”

“Can’t face it?” Alex said quietly. He wondered if he’d gone too far. He’d wanted to be kind, only to end up overwhelming him. 

“My stomach’s in knots,” Yassen admitted apologetically, not adding that just the smell of so much different food was making him feel sick.

“Shit. Sorry.” Alex grimaced. “Right, look, go and lie down or something, yeah? I’ll sort something out for you.”

Yassen studied him for a second, then took him at his word and walked slowly and stiffly back to the mattress. Alex watched him settle himself, seeing the small flinches Yassen was trying to hide every time he moved and wondered if he should really have taken him to a hospital. It hadn’t even occurred to him at the time, his instinct had been to hide both of them and there would have been a lot of awkward questions if he had, but would it have been best for Yassen? If he’d been beaten there might be internal injuries.

Worrying all over again Alex put together a plate of things for Yassen to pick at, small pieces of fresh bread, sliced strawberries, simple flavours and nothing requiring complicated thought.

He carried it across to him and Yassen received it with a look of bemused gratitude.

“Shut up,” Alex said awkwardly, even though Yassen hadn’t said anything.

Yassen hid a slight smile, and looked at the plate instead. “Thank you.” 

“Do you need a doctor?” Alex asked, squatting on the edge of the mattress and biting into some bread and cheese of his own. “Generally, I mean?”

“I don’t think so,” Yassen said thoughtfully. “A good torturer is mostly concerned with how long they can keep you alive. One who inflicts fatal injuries would be no good at all.” He finally put a strawberry slice in his mouth and swallowed. “They employed only the best.”

Alex shuddered. “How are you not clawing at the walls?” he asked quietly. “I think I’d be a sobbing wreck.”

Yassen considered the question, while working away at a piece of crusty bread. It had been a long time since his food had included anything with a bit of bite to it, and he noted his teeth felt looser than they should. It was probably just malnutrition, his gums had receded. What was it Alex had said? Strong look.

“Things happen,” he said finally. “You move past them.”

Alex shook his head. “No way is it that easy.”

“No.” Yassen gave up on the bread, went back to the fruit. The juice made his cracked lips sting, but it was a bright sort of pain compared the dull aches everywhere else, and he focussed on it with something close to enjoyment.

Alex sighed. He didn’t know what he’d expected, that Yassen was going to pour out his soul to him or something. He wanted to help, but he also realised he had no idea how. He wasn’t a psychiatrist, but he knew what Yassen had been through had to have left more than physical marks on him.

“Let me know, yeah?” Alex said finally. “If there’s anything I can do.”

Yassen looked at him. “I suspect you’ve already done more than you should. If your people find out you’re hiding me...”

“You let me worry about that. You’ve got enough problems.” 

Yassen sighed. “I’m grateful for what you’ve done Alex but you really should go. I’m nothing but a dead man walking.”

“No, no you’ll be fine. You’re just weak that’s all,” Alex protested.

Yassen shook his head. “Not what I meant. They will send people.” 

“Who will? Sacre Coeur?”

Yassen moistened his lips, hesitating. At first Alex couldn’t read his expression, then realised with a jolt it was shame.

“I told them everything,” Yassen said finally, looking pained at the admission. “Everything they wanted to know. I held out as long as I could, but in the end - ” 

“They broke you,” Alex whispered, horrified, guessing just how much it would have taken, how _long_. What agonies he must have gone through.

Yassen nodded heavily. 

“What was it they wanted?”

“Revenge against Scorpia. They were responsible – on behalf of a well-paying dictatorship – for the failure of a coup in South America that Sacre Coeur had masterminded.”

“But Scorpia doesn’t exist any more.” Alex frowned, suddenly worried. “Does it?”

“As an organisation, no. But many of the people still live. When they scattered – I was responsible for seeing many of them to safety.” He sagged back, the effort of talking so much exhausting him.

Alex finally understood. “You told Sacre Coeur where they could find them. Scorpia will know it was you.”

“Do you see now, just being with me puts you in terrible danger.” 

Alex considered this, then shrugged. “Must be Tuesday.”

Yassen reached out and cupped Alex’s face, staring at him wonderingly.

Alex covered Yassen's hand with his own then drew it down, held it clasped between both of his. 

“It’ll be okay,” he said softly. “We’ve got this.”

“You are a dangerous man, Alex Rider.”

“I am?” Alex asked, surprised.

“You offer me hope when I thought there was nothing left.”

–


	2. Chapter 2

Over the next few days Alex was relieved to see Yassen slowly regain some of his strength. He lost his deathly-looking pallor and recovered his appetite enough to manage small meals, although he was still too weak to stand for very long and rarely spoke, seemingly lost in his own thoughts. 

At night they shared the mattress. When Yassen realised Alex was having to sleep on the floor he’d immediately offered to swap, arguing that the carpet was still going to be more comfortable than what he had been used to sleeping on, but Alex wouldn’t hear of it. In the end they’d compromised, lying side by side in the darkness. 

If Yassen dreamed, Alex couldn’t tell. His own dreams were troubled and uneasy, full of pursuit and the feeling of loss and he would wake with his heart pounding. Would lie still, listening for Yassen’s quiet breathing beside him, until it lulled him enough to fall asleep again. 

On the fourth day Alex knew he couldn’t leave it any longer before he made contact with MI6. Warning Yassen what he was going to do in case it somehow resulted in him not being able to return, Alex took the metro to a random stop and walked and walked until he found himself in a public square filled with people. 

Took a deep breath and turned his phone on. Before he could make a call it rang in his hand and he almost dropped it in surprise.

“Alex? Thank God.” It was Mrs Jones, and the fact she sounded relieved rather than angry was somewhat unexpected. “Are you alright?”

“I’m fine. What’s wrong?” Her tone suggested something more than his unscheduled disappearance was going on. Alex was immediately on the alert for trouble, looking around him. The square seemed normal. Pigeons, coffee drinkers at the pavement tables, cyclists. Nobody looking at him.

“It’s Bates. He was found last night. Tortured to death.” 

Alex froze. Bates had been a member of the team that took the Sacre Coeur facility. 

“Who by?”

“We don’t know. But the evidence points to the fact he was tortured for information rather than just punishment.”

Alex wondered where his life had gone wrong that he understood what that meant. Lots of small non-life threatening injuries to inflict maximum pain, as opposed to immediate removal of appendages. The same thing that had been done to Yassen. By the same people, he wondered?

“What we don’t know is what they wanted.”

“Names,” Alex said numbly. “They wanted to know who else was on the team.” He should tell her about Yassen. He _should_. But if he did she’d insist on bringing him in, and Alex was damned if he’d rescued Yassen from one prison just to see him locked up in another one.

“You think Sacre Coeur are behind it then?”

Or ex-Scorpia executives, Alex thought, but stayed silent on that particular complication. It could still have been Sacre Coeur, he realised. If they knew Yassen had been taken they’d want to recover him before he could either identify them or warn the other targets. 

“Are the others in hiding?” he asked instead.

“They’re safe. Are you?”

“For now. I’m going to ditch this phone,” Alex said, thinking guiltily that Bates’ murder had saved him from having to explain what he’d been up to. They clearly thought he too had been in hiding from pursuit. “You won’t hear from me for a while.”

“Alex we still need to know - ”

“Best you don’t know where we are.” He hung up and thought – fuck. What had possessed him to say ‘we’? He’d been distracted, thinking through the angles. If it was Scorpia and Bates had given them his name it would be the one that stuck out like a red flag in relation to Yassen. He had to get back to him. Alex looked around again at the innocent looking square and wondered with a shiver how many CCTV cameras were currently picking him up on their feed.

–

“We have to go.” Alex burst into the apartment staggering under the weight of supplies he’d stocked up on, forcing himself to think tactically rather than dash back in a blind panic. 

“What’s wrong?” Yassen levered himself to his feet and stood swaying slightly, one hand on the table to steady himself. 

Alex told him about Bates. 

“It’s started. I told you this would happen.”

“God I’d forgotten how depressing you were.” Alex came over to him, thrust an empty rucksack into his arms. “Pack some stuff.”

“Where are we going?”

Alex hesitated. “I’ll tell you when I’ve figured that part out.”

It was Yassen’s turn to hesitate. “I know a place. Nobody else will know about it.”

“Still in France?”

“Yes.”

“We’d be safe there?”

“As safe as anywhere, yes.”

“Then let’s go.”

“You have a car?”

“Yes.”

Yassen nodded. “Ditch it. Get another one.” 

Alex smiled slightly at the authoritative tone that had suddenly appeared in Yassen's voice now there were plans to be made, decisions to be taken. 

“Good to have you back.”

–

Alex drove, with Yassen giving directions from the passenger seat. They stopped twice for Alex to buy more supplies, splitting the list so he wouldn't be memorable for buying a large amount at once but with few enough stops not to leave a trail. They needed enough to be able to drop off the grid for an extended period and when they arrived Alex saw how that might be possible.

They'd driven south into Provence, the road winding between immense limestone cliffs. Eventually Yassen alerted Alex to a turning, and he was glad he'd had warning because he'd never have found it unguided. It was barely a track, and severely overgrown. Alex guided the jolting car slowly along the long driveway, wincing on Yassen's behalf every time they hit a particularly deep pothole. 

At the end was a cabin built on what amounted to little more than a ledge of the cliff. The pitted stone stretched up above them and down to the valley floor, bushes and creepers softening the edges. The air was warm but felt blessedly cool after the stifling car and Alex followed Yassen inside with a rising curiosity.

The place was all on one floor, one main open plan room, two bedrooms and a bathroom. It was sparsely furnished but clean, and one wall was nearly all glass.

Alex saw there was a deck outside, and looking to Yassen for permission he slid the door open and stepped out. He caught his breath. The deck was built out over the ravine itself, and he could see a bird - a hawk of some kind - wheeling on a current below him.

"What do you think?" Yassen had come out behind him, was leaning against the window, watching him.

"It's spectacular," Alex said, turning to look at him. "That view."

"I own most of the land you can see," Yassen said. "Not that it stops people crossing it necessarily, but it guarantees no other buildings can come any closer."

"It's the perfect bolthole."

Yassen came to lean next to him against the rail. "It was a retirement plan," he admitted quietly. "Somewhere I would have been able to disappear to. Somewhere nobody knew about."

Alex looked sideways at him, understanding what he was saying and also what it meant that Yassen had trusted him enough to bring him here. "I won't tell anyone." 

Yassen just nodded. They both knew there was no such thing as an inviolable secret. Yassen more than most. But somehow in their rush to leave the flat there'd been no question that wherever they were going, they were going together.

–

As the days passed they settled into a rhythm, and Yassen slowly regained enough strength to devise a series of exercises to build his muscle-tone and stamina back up. Alex worked out alongside him, being both a yard stick for Yassen to compete against and a scolding presence when Alex could clearly see him over-doing it.

Yassen would inevitably ignore him then get to the point where he'd cramp and fall on the floor groaning and half-laughing as Alex rolled his eyes and threw cushions at him.

Despite Alex's occasional coaxing, Yassen had remained silent on the details of what he'd been through. Alex couldn't help thinking that it would help to at least acknowledge the possibility it might have a lasting impact but Yassen had brushed off every attempt at getting him to open up.

"I'm fine," was all he would say. "It's over. Forget about it."

 _You're not fine,_ Alex wanted to shout. _Nobody could be, after going through that. Not even you._ But he kept quiet. If Yassen wasn't ready to talk about it, pushing could do more harm than good. 

Alex knew it had taken him years to talk to someone about what he'd been through himself. MI6 had insisted he go through a comprehensive evaluation and counselling programme before accepting him as a full-time agent, and while he'd only gone along under protest, to his surprise it had actually helped. It had also been an extremely painful process, so he could hardly blame Yassen for wanting to simply bury the memories while they were still this fresh.

 _I'm fine._ How many times had Alex said that himself? Was that how he knew Yassen was lying? 

–

Alex didn’t give up. He didn’t pester, but he wanted Yassen to know that he was there, if he wanted to talk. It finally occurred to him that asking Yassen to open up about things without being willing to share himself was possibly not the way to inspire confidence, and so one afternoon when they were out on the deck and Yassen seemed to be in a fairly level mood for once, Alex quietly told him about some of the things he’d been through, and how they’d made him feel. What a wreck he’d been, for a long time. How he’d eventually come through it.

Yassen listened without interrupting, looking sombre.

“I’m sorry,” he said, when Alex finally drew to a halt. “Everything that happened to you was ultimately because of me. My actions.”

“What? No. That’s not what what I was getting at at all!” Alex looked pained. He’d meant to empathise, not make Yassen feel guilty. Shit.

Yassen gave him a thin smile. “I know,” he said. “It’s true though.”

“If it hadn’t been you that killed Ian, it would have been somebody else, right?” 

Yassen nodded slowly. “Also true.”

“So shut up.”

Yassen’s smile widened, then he looked serious again, staring out over the valley. "I don't even know how I'm supposed to feel," he admitted finally. 

Alex shook his head. "I don't think there is a right answer. How _do_ you feel?"

Yassen didn't reply for some time. "Angry," he said eventually, to Alex's surprise. "Just so - angry. I've always liked to think I had control of my emotions but I can feel this building rage inside of me and I'm afraid if I let myself think about what they made me do it will boil over. I feel like I could burn down the world." 

“Yassen?” Alex whispered. “Tell me what happened.”

Yassen hung his head. “I gave them everything,” he said. “Every _one_. Even when they’d run out of names to ask about, I gave them others. Every agent or person of interest I could think of. Just to make it stop, even if it was only for a second.”

“Anybody would have,” Alex said softly. “I’m damn sure you held out longer than I could have.”

Yassen met his eyes with a marked reluctance. “I should have been better.”

“Bullshit.” 

Yassen almost smiled. Almost. “There was only one...” he tailed off, looking away over the valley. 

“One what?”

“Name. That I held on to. I don’t know how, I only know that I did. I think perhaps I’d convinced myself it was something that happened in another life. Or to somebody else. Or maybe I’d just buried everything too deeply for even them to find.”

“Who?” Alex prompted, curious now, whose identity and whereabouts Yassen would have taken to the grave with him to protect. “Who was it?” 

Realising even as he asked that if Yassen had withstood months of torture and kept the secret he was unlikely to just come out with it now. But Yassen turned back to him and gave him a sad smile.

“You can’t guess?”

Alex was halfway through shaking his head when the look in Yassen’s eyes finally caused the penny to drop.

“Me?” 

Yassen's smile widened a fraction at Alex’s obvious astonishment.

“You,” he agreed quietly, and went back to staring out over the valley. 

Alex studied his profile silently. Yassen still looked gaunt and malnourished but the hollowness in his cheeks and the bruises under his eyes had gone. His hair was growing back out from its impulsive shaving and the marks on his skin were fading – at least the ones that weren’t going to become permanent scars. Alex had the sudden unreasonable urge to just walk over and put his arms around him. 

Instead he moved to lean next to him against the rail, staring out at the view in silence. The warm wind blowing up the ravine ruffled his hair, and he absent-mindedly ran a hand through it. 

“Maybe they’ll just all take each other out,” Alex said after a while, not having the least idea what to say about Yassen’s surprising revelation and so shelving it for later consideration. “Kill each other off, whatever’s left of Scorpia and Sacre Coeur.”

“It’s a nice idea.”

“You don’t think it’s likely?”

“There’s always someone with a grudge.” Yassen sounded tired. 

“Maybe they won’t find you here.”

“I’ll have to go out to buy food eventually. “And while I have money hidden here it’s not enough to last me the rest of my natural life.” Yassen gave a humourless laugh. “Although I suppose that depends how long that is.”

Alex hit him lightly on the arm. “Stop that.”

Yassen looked sideways at him. “You call that a punch? I’ve been tortured by the best, you know.”

“Oh my God.” Alex couldn’t stop the splutter of laughter. “Well I’m glad you can joke about it.”

“Technically it’s true,” Yassen pointed out. “Besides, if nothing else it was certainly instructive. I mean, if you ever need someone tortured, let me know.”

Alex gave him a horrified look, then caught the smile and launched himself at him with a peal of appalled laughter. Yassen fielded him with both hands but was off balance from the start and they staggered across the balcony, each trying to tip the other onto the floor. 

Alex had his arms around Yassen’s waist in a wrestling hold and Yassen had him in a headlock and before long they ended up sprawled on the decking, panting and laughing. 

“Call it a draw?” Alex suggested and Yassen nodded agreement, stretching out on his back and shading his eyes from the sun.

“It’s going to rain.”

Alex sat up, staring into the cloudless sky. “You’re kidding, right?”

“No. It doesn’t rain often here, but when it does it rains hard. Can’t you feel the change in pressure?”

“No because I’m not a barometer,” Alex objected. Yassen laughed again at that and Alex felt unlooked-for affection for the man curling warmly inside him. 

He’d never imagined he could feel protective of someone like Yassen, but he’d been through so much, and Alex knew what that was like. Knew too, how confusing it could feel after you’d believed you were going to die and found yourself still alive. How empty and directionless you felt, while people expected you to be happy about it.

Alex watched Yassen lying stretched out on the sun-warmed planks until his heart ached too much to bear and he had to go inside, with the muttered excuse he was going to prepare their evening meal.

–

After supper Yassen was moving round the kitchenette tidying things away, when he idly put a left-over raspberry in his mouth without really looking. It had had the first signs of mould blooming on the bottom, and the taste hit him like a concrete wall. Before he knew it he was leaning over the sink choking and retching, not from the flavour but what it brought back, the food in the compound, so often spoiled, the food he’d had to eat or starve. 

He reached blindly for the tap but it was too late, there was no tap, no kitchen, no cabin, he was back in his cell with the filthy floor, the stench and the pain.

Alex found him crouching in the angle between the cupboards, knees drawn up to his chin, shaking.

“Yassen? Yassen!” He dropped to his knees beside him, reached out tentatively, unsure if Yassen even knew he was there. Yassen turned to look at him, shoulders heaving as he fought for breath. Alex was relieved at least to see recognition in his eyes. Whatever it was, it had passed.

“Happy now?” 

It took Alex a second to work out what he’d said.

“What? What are you talking about?” He stared at him, then leaned in and took him by the shoulders. “Yassen what the fuck?”

Yassen wiped away a line of saliva with the heel of his wrist, shook his head. 

“What happened?” Alex coaxed, softening his grip and his voice, stroking one thumb comfortingly over his arm. “Yassen.” 

He took a shuddering breath and Alex felt a little of the tension go out of him, but he could also see the walls going up again.

“Something – took me back, that’s all,” Yassen admitted finally. 

“Shit.” Alex slid down to sit on the floor next to him, shoulder to shoulder. “Flashbacks?”

“It was like I was there,” Yassen breathed. “I could see it, feel it. Smell it.” He grimaced.

“Has this happened before?”

Yassen hesitated, then gave a reluctant nod. “Twice.”

Alex stared at him in surprise. “What? Why the fuck didn’t you tell me?”

A slight rise and fall of the shoulders. “What could you do about it?” 

“And what did you mean, happy now?” Alex asked, rather hurt.

Yassen sighed. “That you were right, I suppose. That I’m not as unaffected by it all as I was making out. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it.” 

Before he really thought about what he was doing, Alex had leaned in and kissed Yassen on the cheek.

Yassen looked round at him in surprise. “What was that for?” he asked finally.

“I don’t know,” Alex muttered defensively. “It was that or slap you.” 

Yassen’s lips twitched. “Well on balance I suppose I should be grateful.” 

Alex smiled back, feeling helpless, and Yassen sighed. "With the blackouts - I'm so afraid I'll end up hurting you without meaning to," he admitted.

"I'm tougher than I look." 

Yassen smiled at that. "I know," he said softly. 

Alex hesitantly reached out and laid his hand over Yassen's, curled them together. Was glad when Yassen didn't pull away from the touch, but briefly squeezed his fingers. 

"It'll be okay," Alex said. "Maybe not yet, maybe not for a long time. But it will be okay."

"How can you know that?"

"I made it. And you're tougher than me."

Yassen finally looked at him properly. "I don't know that I am," he said. "Look what I became. You didn't. And you could have."

"We're both still here though," Alex pointed out. "Where there's life there's hope, right?" 

"A strange motto to offer a hitman," Yassen said, but with a slight curve to his lips.

"What would you prefer, 'give it a shot'?" Alex retorted, then grinned as Yassen's shoulders shook with silent laughter. Maybe they would make it through this after all.

–

The rain came just after they’d gone to bed. Alex listened to it drumming on the roof, feeling cosy under the blankets and wondering how smug Yassen would be that he’d been right. 

Under the noise of the rain he heard another sound and listened intently, wondering if Yassen had got up again for some reason. He thought he heard the scraping slide of the patio door opening and sat up in sudden anxiety. If Yassen was having blackouts and didn’t know where he was, that was a hell of a drop to be fooling around near.

Alex got up and went to see what was going on. Sure enough, Yassen was standing out on the deck but he didn’t seem to be at all upset, he was simply standing there in the bucketing rain, face turned upwards, unmoving.

“Yassen?”

He looked round at the sound of Alex’s voice but stayed where he was, already soaked to the skin. 

“You’ll catch your death!” Alex protested, half-laughing. He’d been worried, but Yassen looked almost happy. Lighter, somehow.

“I can’t remember the last time I felt rain on my face,” he said, tilting his head back to better feel the pelting drops. 

Alex smiled, leaning against the doorframe and just watching him for a while. Part of him wanted to go out and join him, knowing how exhilarating the rain would feel, but he hung back, afraid of intruding where he wasn’t wanted. After a while he ducked back inside to put on a pot of coffee and fetch a towel, knowing Yassen might be enjoying it right now but would be cold and wet when he finally came in. Alex hadn’t rescued him from the jaws of hell just for the bloody man to catch pneumonia now.

Later, watching Yassen sitting with his legs tucked under him in the arm chair, sipping from a steaming mug with the towel round his shoulders, Alex thought he looked about ten years younger. Something had lifted from him, almost tangibly. 

Yassen caught him looking, and to Alex’s surprise he smiled. “You must think I’m mad.”

“No?” Alex shook his head. “I mean, I prefer my showers warm, but you do you.”

Yassen gave a quiet laugh. “I didn’t think I’d ever see the sky again,” he admitted. “I thought I was going to die in that place. I’d accepted it.”

Not for the first time, Alex had to resist the urge to simply go over and hug him. 

“We need a plan,” he said instead. He hated the idea of Yassen swapping one prison for another of his own making and exiling himself here. 

“What do you suggest?” 

“What’s the main threat? Sacre Coeur or Scorpia?”

Yassen considered. “It depends. The latter requires Sacre Coeur to make unsuccessful attempts on my old associates. Which is possible. A threat from that direction would be more dangerous, I think.”

“But it requires a lot of getting to,” Alex nodded. “So get rid of Sacre Coeur first, you neutralise the threat. You must know who they are, right? I mean, they didn’t figure on you getting out alive, they must have shown themselves to you?”

Yassen nodded thoughtfully. “Yes, I could identify them alright.” The implications of what Alex was saying finally reached him and he looked amused. “Are you suggesting I take them all out?”

“Why not?”

“Is that the official advice of the British government?”

Alex shrugged. “To be honest, I can’t see them objecting.”

–

They came for them at midnight the following night. 

Alex and Yassen had been about to turn in, when Alex noticed a movement in the shadows outside. He’d thought it was a reflection at first, they never closed the blinds, because who was going to see in other than the birds? But the shape was in the wrong place and his eyes suddenly made sense of it. Not a reflection of one of them but a man dressed all in black, holding an assault rifle.

“Yassen!” The single cry of warning was all he could get out before the figure outside fired and Alex flinched as a hail of bullets smashed into the glass – and no further.

He turned in time to see Yassen drop to the floor and ran forward, afraid not that he’d been shot but that the gunfire had triggered an episode – but Yassen was on his knees pulling back the rug and then a trapdoor hatch that Alex hadn’t even known was there.

For a wild moment Alex thought maybe it was an escape tunnel but no, below it was simply a storage space – and it was filled with guns. A lot of guns.

Crashing behind them suggested someone had broken in at the front, and trusting Yassen to deal with the man coming through the window Alex snatched up a gun, turned and fired all in one movement. He never doubted for a second it would be loaded because this was Yassen, the man apparently had bullet-proof windows, of course his guns were going to be loaded. 

The man who’d come first through the door fell backwards into his colleague, Alex’s bullet between his eyes. There were more of them now, forcing their way in from both front door and balcony and Alex and Yassen moved closer together, instinctively facing off at an angle where they could cover both each other and the weapon cache. 

No time to run or take shelter, they’d be shot in the back before they’d taken a step. Their only chance of survival was to take out every single attacker before one got a lucky shot in.

Their terrible odds were made slightly better by the fact Yassen had an automatic sub-machine gun. Alex concentrated on making his own shots count, making sure to avoid the body armour, aiming grimly for the face or neck every time. 

It felt like hours, but in reality it had barely been a minute. The cabin was shot to pieces, there were two heaps of dead intruders bleeding out across the floor, but somehow they were both still standing. 

Both were bleeding, mostly from flying debris although a bullet had also torn through Yassen’s shirt and grazed his shoulder. He hadn’t even noticed.

“What the fuck?” Alex said finally, his breath sounding loud to him in the sudden silence.

Yassen turned one of the bodies over with his foot, then searched it for identification, shaking his head when he found nothing. “I’d say Sacre Coeur, but it would be a guess.” 

Distracted and concerned by the blood soaking through Yassen’s sleeve, Alex was walking over to him when one of the supposed corpses lurched up from the floor and grabbed him by the throat. 

He didn’t even see Yassen move, but suddenly the pressure was gone again and there was a sickening crack as Yassen broke the man’s neck. 

Yassen looked disgustedly down at the body and then suspiciously at the rest. Walked over to the weapons cache, selected another gun and systematically went through every single fallen figure, shooting each one in the head, just in case. 

Alex tried not to flinch at each shot. It looked cold but he could see the fury behind Yassen’s eyes and it almost frightened him more than the assault had. When every last one of their attackers had been accounted for, Yassen threw the gun to one side and then dragged them outside one by one and heaved them over the rail to fall hundreds of feet to the valley floor. They’d be bones before anyone found them, down there.

He came back inside, his flare of anger drained by exhaustion and sat down heavily on a chair, aware of Alex watching him. 

“Are you alright?” Yassen asked. Alex was too pale, and Yassen wondered bleakly if it was the shock of the attack or from watching what he’d done afterwards.

Alex nodded numbly. “I’ll just never get used to killing,” he admitted. “I hate it.”

“Lucky for me you’re also good at it.” Yassen slumped forward tiredly, elbows on his knees, head bowed. He wasn’t at anything like full strength yet and the fight had left him weak and wrung out. “How the hell did they find us?”

It was a good question, and Alex pondered it. If Yassen had been confident nobody knew about this place, Alex believed him. Which meant they’d been followed somehow? But if that was the case, however unlikely, he’d have expected the attack to come before now. Neither of them had a mobile phone or a laptop with them, the cabin didn’t even have a landline. How had they been traced? Yassen had been stark naked when he rescued him, they couldn’t have planted a tracker anywhere. 

A memory nudged at him, a ridge of skin under his fingers. Alex stared. 

“I think I know.”

Yassen looked up. “How?”

“Take your shirt off.”

“What?” 

“Just do it.” Alex was on his feet now, and Yassen complied without further argument. As Alex circled around behind him he leaned forward again, feeling Alex’s fingers trace lightly down his spine. He’d guessed, by now, what Alex was thinking.

“Is there something there?” he asked tightly.

“It’s under the skin. I thought it was just a scar,” Alex breathed, fingers finding the place again, tracing the shape of it. He should have realised before, but he’d been wary of causing Yassen more pain and also been more shy about touching him. 

Yassen sat up and looked at him. “Get a knife. You’ll have to do it, I won’t be able to see what I’m doing back there.”

Alex stared at him. “Have we got any anaesthetic?”

Yassen gave a short bitter laugh. “Trust me, I’ve had worse.”

Alex fetched water and paper towels and plasters then went over to the kitchen and picked up the sharpest knife he could find. He hesitated, wondering if he should pour boiling water over it or hold it in the gas flame or something. Yassen guessed his thoughts and beckoned him impatiently back over.

“It will be fine. I don’t take infections easily.”

Alex would have argued, but he realised Yassen was right, all of the angry looking open wounds had healed over nicely. He was just delaying the moment when he’d have to cut into Yassen’s skin, that was all.

Yassen bent right over, stretching the skin out, offering himself up to Alex’s hands with such obvious trust and confidence in him that it made Alex’s throat tighten.

Alex swallowed. “Ready?”

“Do it.”

Biting his lip and willing his hand not to shake, Alex sliced into his back. Blood ran over his fingers and he winced, but Yassen didn’t make a sound. He could feel the chip now, hard edges slippery with blood. He teased it out, feeling dizzy with relief as it came free, then carefully cleaned the small wound and dressed it, along with the graze on his arm.

He rinsed off the chip and dropped it into Yassen’s outstretched hand.

Yassen dropped it on the floor and brought the leg of his chair down on it heavily, crushing it into fragments of plastic and metal. 

“It’s too late isn’t it?” Alex said. Yassen nodded.

“We need to go.”

Alex sighed, accepting the facts but also feeling sorry for Yassen, who liked this place and would never feel he could come back. He turned toward the bedroom intending to start packing but to his surprise Yassen called him back.

“Alex. You’d better check there are no more.”

“What? You think there’s more than one?”

“It’s what I’d do,” Yassen said grimly.

“Jesus.” 

Yassen stripped off the rest of his clothes then stood perfectly still as Alex awkwardly examined every inch of him. Alex could feel himself blushing furiously, but Yassen seemed quite matter of fact about it, and he forced himself to do a thorough job, knowing what skipping anywhere could mean for both of them.

In the end his diligence paid off when he found a second one below Yassen’s left buttock. This was dispatched as efficiently as the first, and they looked at each other.

“Good job,” was all Yassen said, resting a hand on Alex’s shoulder before picking up his clothes and disappearing into his room. 

–

They washed, changed and packed the minimum of essentials, most of that being the guns and a couple of bags that had lain underneath them in the store. Outside, Alex headed automatically for the car but Yassen walked past it, disappearing up the track into the dark.

Alex followed him curiously. He surely couldn’t be intending to walk the whole way, not with the weight of armaments they were currently toting, but did he perhaps think the car had been tampered with? 

Round the first bend Alex discovered Yassen had found what he was looking for, two large black people carriers. “What do you reckon?” Yassen asked with a slight smile. “I think this would be faster.”

“Can we even start it?” Alex asked dubiously, only for Yassen to hold up a key he must have taken from one of the dead men.

Before long they were speeding into the night. 

Dawn saw them on the outskirts of Avignon, and Yassen pulled up outside the airport. 

“This is where we part company,” he said quietly. 

Alex looked at him in shock. He’d been expecting – what had he been expecting? That they would go on together. Certainly, that they would have more time together. 

“I could come with you?” he said uncertainly. Yassen had clearly made his mind up. Perhaps he didn’t even want him there.

Yassen shook his head slightly. “Thank you. But where I’m going – what I shall have to do – you can’t be involved in that Alex.”

“I could help.” More insistent now.

Yassen smiled slightly. “A few hours ago you were telling me how much you hated killing. No, it’s better this way. I wouldn’t wish this on you.”

“But...” Alex faltered. Yassen was right, he knew, and he’d even expected this moment to come, just – not yet. “Will you be alright?” he said lamely.

Yassen nodded. “Thanks to you. Thank you, Alex. For everything.” He remembered something and leaned back to search in one of the bags he’d stashed on the back seat, pulled out an envelope of cash. “Should be enough for a plane ticket,” he explained, handing it over.

Alex took it silently, still making no move to get out of the car. There was so much he wanted to say and he didn’t have words for any of it, didn’t even know if Yassen would want to hear it. Didn’t fully understand it himself.

“I missed you,” he said suddenly. “When I thought you were dead. I missed you.” That hardly covered the warring emotions he’d been subject to, but in the end after everything was said and done, it was what it had come down to. 

“I missed you too,” Yassen said softly, to his surprise. “There were times – ” he sighed, then shook his head. “I felt it was safer for you if I stayed away.”

“Let me know this time, yeah?” Alex said. “That you’re okay. Come and – come and see me or something.”

“You would want that?”

Alex nodded, and Yassen let out a quiet breath.

“Alright.” 

“Just – be careful, okay?”

“I will. You too.” 

Alex nodded again, fidgeting with the envelope in his hands. Finally opened the door, grabbed his bag from between his feet, turned to jump out. 

Then abruptly turned back, leaned in and kissed Yassen hard on the mouth.

Alex pulled back, breathing hard. Yassen looked startled but didn’t object, just stared at him in surprise, as if waiting for Alex to explain. Alex swallowed, gave him a rueful smile, and slipped out of the car.

Yassen watched him all the way to the doors. He didn’t look back.

Realising his fingers were resting unconsciously on his lips, Yassen frowned, shook himself, and started the car.

–

Mrs Jones was walking past the security office when the alarms went off and she almost dropped her coffee.

“What’s happening?” she demanded, stepping into the room and glancing over the wall of screens.

“Someone just used an out of date code to try and get in the side entrance.” He brought up the relevant screen and she stared at the figure it showed, staring right up at the hidden camera with his hands open as if to say - ‘really?’

“Let him in,” she ordered. “And turn those bloody alarms off.”

Alex was ushered into a briefing room and provided with coffee and a Twix. After a while he was joined by Jones, Crawley and Smithers. 

“Alex. Glad to see you’re well,” Mrs Jones began.

“Thanks.”

“Where have you been?”

“Keeping my head down. As you recommended.”

“Who were you with?”

Alex shook his head. “No-one.”

“When we spoke you implied you were.”

“I stayed with a friend. For a while.”

“What happened with Sacre Coeur Alex?”

“It was confusing. I got separated from the rest of the team.”

Jones and Smithers exchanged glances and Alex thought, _fuck_. They knew something. Or did they only suspect?

“I know you like to think you’re smarter than everyone else Alex, but we do occasionally manage to achieve our objectives,” Smithers said dryly. “The mission was successful, in that we retrieved the data file we wanted. In the confusion it turns out we took a lot more than we actually needed, which has proven interesting reading. It included files on their prisoners.”

“They do say it’s good to keep a diary,” Alex murmured. 

“What happened there Alex? Who have you been with?” Mrs Jones persisted.

“Is this a de-brief or an interrogation?”

“That rather depends on how willing you are to answer what should be very simple questions,” Crawley put in.

Alex sighed. “Why are you even asking me? Sounds like you already know.” Started hurriedly eating the Twix in case they decided to take it away again. At this time of the morning that would be torture enough. 

“Gregorovich.” There was still a hint of a question to the way Mrs Jones said it and Alex considered bluffing. He was a good liar. Better than they knew. But fuck it.

“Yes.”

“He’s alive.”

“Barely, when I found him. They’d taken him apart pretty comprehensively.” 

“And now?” Crawley stared at him as if horribly fascinated. “What did you do, nurse him back to health like an injured bird?”

Alex almost choked on the last mouthful of Twix. It was technically true, but hardly a flattering image for either of them and he was rather glad Yassen wasn’t there to hear it.

"You didn't see the state of him. I couldn't just leave him there," Alex said, ignoring the fact that he'd been prepared to do exactly that until he'd realised who it was. 

"You still could have brought him in," Mrs Jones pointed out. "He would have been of use to us."

"He barely knew who he was."

"And now?"

Alex was silent and she sighed. "Where have you been? Exactly. Give us the location."

Alex shook his head again. 

"Alex!"

"He won't go back there anyway, there's no point."

"Then there's also no reason for you not to tell us."

"I promised I wouldn't say." 

He was aware they were exchanging looks around him.

"Do you know where he is now?" Smithers asked.

"No. He went off to do - whatever it is he does. I don't know where. That's the truth."

"Won't you tell us where you've been?"

"No."

"If he contacts you in the future will you inform us?" Crawley asked. 

Alex hesitated. Then - 

"No."

Mrs Jones screwed the cap back onto her pen and set it down with a click. "Then I'm afraid you leave us no choice."

He glanced up, suddenly fearful of what the punishment might be, but she just shook her head. "You're a security risk Alex. We have to consider you compromised. I have no choice but to relieve you of your duties. As of now you no longer work for this department."

Alex sat up in shock. "But I haven't done anything! I didn't - like - tell him any secrets or anything! I just helped an injured man get better!"

"And that's the only reason you're not actually under arrest right now," said Mrs Jones calmly. "And that's at my discretion, so I suggest you're very careful what you say next Alex."

"I've told you the truth!" Alex said bitterly. "I could have lied, about everything, but I didn't. Doesn't that prove I'm not a risk?"

"The problem is," Mrs Jones sighed. "This isn't a lapse in judgement we're talking about here. You didn't think you were doing the right thing, and simply got it wrong. You were fully aware of the fact you were breaking protocol, and you did it anyway."

"You can still change your mind Alex," Smithers offered gently. "Show you’re willing to give us Gregorovich. Tell us where you've been, and agree to call it in if he gets in touch. That's all you have to do. Like you say, he probably won't go back there and it's likely he may never contact you in the future. You might never have to do anything other than give us the assurance you are still on our side, Alex. That's not unreasonable, is it?"

Alex swallowed. He'd fought against this as a career to begin with, but he'd come to see he was made for it. He was good at it. Could he throw it all away for what might be an empty gesture?

He remembered Yassen crouched, shaking in a corner of the cabin. Pictured him lying on the wooden deck in the sunshine, looking up at him and laughing. Pictured him staring back at him from the driver's seat of a stolen car. Remembered the fleeting warmth of Yassen's mouth against his. Yassen had promised he’d be in touch, but after Alex’s impulsive parting gesture how likely was that now?

Alex unclipped his ID badge and pushed it across the table. 

"I'd say it's been fun, but - you know." Alex got to his feet. "I promised I'd tell the truth." 

–

"Hey." Alex walked into Tom's top floor office without knocking and threw himself onto the visitor's couch, helping himself to a fistful of sweets from the jar on the coffee table.

Tom eyed him with surprise. He was used to Alex's erratic comings and goings by now, but he rarely visited him at the studio.

"Hey. Long time no see. Thought you were off doing something covert and hush hush."

Alex gave him a rueful smile. "I was."

"What's up?" Tom frowned, finally registering Alex's subdued mood.

"I kind've got fired."

"What?" Tom wheeled his swivel chair out from behind the desk and shuffled it over to him at speed. "They can't do that. Can they?" He looked confused, then suspicious. "What did you do?"

"Why should have I have done anything!" Alex demanded indignantly. Tom just raised an eyebrow and Alex sighed. "Fine. I might've, technically, I dunno, committed treason or something." 

Tom's eyes widened and the laugh died on his lips as he realised Alex was serious.

"Alex! What did you do?"

"You know I can't say," Alex sighed. "Official Secrets Bollocks and all that, even if I'm fired."

"You didn't like - shoot the Queen or something did you?" Tom asked, half-hopefully.

"No! I was just helping someone, that's all. Just - he's kind've technically classified as an enemy of the state or something, so...yeah. Hello P45." 

"And...you knew that at the time?"

Alex shrugged. 

"Fucking hell Alex!"

"Don't you start!"

"Sorry." Tom gave him a sympathetic grin. "What will you do?"

"Dunno. Haven't thought that far. Only just happened." 

"Still. You've got like - special skills, yeah?"

"Not entirely sure how many of them are transferable," Alex muttered. 

"Hell of a CV though."

They stared at each other and both started laughing helplessly.

–


	3. Chapter 3

Unlike some people he’d worked with, Yassen had never taken a particular pleasure in killing. Satisfaction, pride even in a job well done yes of course, but the act of murder itself had never held an inherent allure for him. Even now, faced with more emotional turmoil than he’d ever experienced in his life, he refused to let his heart rule his head. He located, he planned, and he executed.

There was a strict order of priority and he followed it to the letter. Firstly he had to identify and eliminate the operatives sent after those Scorpia executives he’d been charged with the protection of. He was successful in all instances – bar one.

He hadn’t suffered a repeat of his incapacitating flashbacks since the moment in the cabin and had begun to hope he’d moved past them. But moving in towards his objective from the top of an adjacent building, he caught a whiff of the acrid bitumen being used to repair a nearby flat roof and the smell was enough to slam the memory of his torture back into the forefront of his mind.

He hadn’t even remembered it consciously until this moment. They must have been resurfacing the parking area or something that day, the smell of hot tar drifting in through the vents. It was a dislocating thought, the idea that routine maintenance had been going on around him while he’d been locked in a room and subjected to the most degrading agonies. Had the same person who’d ordered his torture signed the order for the repair works? Had it meant any more or less to them? 

When he recovered his senses he was lying curled into a foetal position, shaking like a dog. His gun lay beside him, disregarded, and he thanked a God he didn’t believe in that he hadn’t been seen.

Yassen clawed his way back to a standing position, checking his weapon. While he’d remained unobserved there were alarms blaring in the house compound below, and he instinctively knew he was too late to prevent the murder.

Oh well. Damage limitation, then. From his vantage point on the roof he saw a door open below, and the man he’d been following ran out. He was clearly being chased and Yassen frowned. Had the man’s plan gone wrong, or was he just this sloppy? Shame he wouldn’t live and learn, really.

Yassen raised the gun, sighted on his quarry, fired. And missed.

It startled him almost as much as the man below, who made the fatal mistake of stopping in his tracks to look round. Luckily for Yassen he clearly assumed the shot had come from the direction of pursuit rather than above, which gave Yassen the extra second he needed to clear his mind, steady his hand, and fire again.

This time he was on target and the man dropped to the ground, brains spread over the wall behind him. Yassen slid out of sight until he was sitting down, back against the parapet wall. He studied his hands. They were shaking, and he balled them into fists, taking slow, calming breaths. 

He’d done what he came for, but now he was left with the problem that the rest of the surviving household would be aware of what had happened and might start asking awkward questions. 

Once more Yassen checked his gun, checked the spare ammunition. Noted too that his hands were no longer shaking. Good.

The problem would not remain a problem for long.

–

Once the immediate threats had been taken care of Yassen turned his attention to those who had been in charge, the executive officers placing the orders. Yassen noted with interest that these kills conferred a noticeably higher sense of satisfaction, despite being less complicated. The first group had been trained killers, and had required a commensurate level of skill to take out. As fellow professionals, Yassen had made the kills as quick and clean as he could. These though – these were the ones who had directed what was done to him, and therefore they deserved a little more – personal attention.

Finally, the third tranche. Strictly speaking, they did not need eliminating at all. They had simply done a job they were paid for, with no interest in the information recovered. Professionally, Yassen didn’t need to go after them. Neither was he in any continued danger from them. 

He hadn’t killed many people in his life for purely personal reasons. This, then, would be interesting.

It had occurred to him of course, that there were probably others he had no memory of, torturers who had come and gone while he was delirious or drugged, or those responsible for inflicting pain from afar by controlling the light, the noise, the temperature. He accepted he could do nothing about those, and so didn’t dwell on it. It was important to have achievable goals.

There were enough he retained a clear memory of. Unremarkable men in their own way, but their faces seared onto his memory. Names, too, in some cases. It was staggering how many people were careless of the details when they assumed you would be dying shortly.

One, in particular. His primary tormentor, Yassen saved until last. There was a practical reason for this, which was that he accepted he couldn’t guarantee how he would react when he saw him again. It was possible it would cause an uncontrolled trauma response. He didn’t think so – so far the episodes he’d experienced had been triggered by more indirectly related stimuli, a taste, a smell. But he had to be prepared for the possibility. 

Yassen knew that by going after him, he was putting himself at risk. He could end up vulnerable. He could end up back in the man’s hands. 

He went anyway. He went because of it. He would allow himself no lingering weakness.

He had to admit it was quite a satisfying moment, when Mr Andreas Perrin let himself into his neat little apartment, and looked up to find Yassen sitting on his couch.

“You.” He stared at Yassen, apparently frozen to the spot, colour draining from his face. 

Yassen got slowly to his feet, nodding slowly. It was good, that the man both recognised him and understood what his presence meant. It saved tedious explanations. And he felt nothing but an icy calm.

Showing a belated spark of self-preservation, Perrin turned and tried to wrench the door open again. 

Yassen shot him in the back of the neck with a tranquilliser dart. 

When Perrin came round, it was to find himself strapped to a table. He didn’t recognise his surroundings, but he recognised the man watching him with interest from a nearby chair, and started babbling in panic.

“Look. It wasn’t personal, you must see that surely? I was doing a job that’s all. I took no pleasure in it.”

“Oh, I think you did,” said Yassen slowly. “You, above all of them.”

“Please. I have money. I can pay you? Whatever you want. Look, we can work something out, I know we can. One professional to another? Come on. You’re paid to use your skills, I’m paid to use mine. You can’t blame me for that, surely?”

“On the contrary. It was very educational.” Yassen considered the small, sharp knife in his hand, then looked up. “Let me show you how much I learned.” 

–

Two months had passed since Alex had been turned out on his ear by MI6. He’d heard nothing from them since, and hadn’t really expected to. He’d heard nothing from Yassen either, and wondered if he ever would. 

At Tom’s urging he’d finally taken a holiday, flying out to Sicily in the hope a change of scene might cheer him up, but it turned out it was just being miserable in the sunshine instead.

Alex wandered the dusty streets of Palermo, preoccupied and morose. He had no real aim in sight, was just trying to leave behind the claustrophobic crowds of tourists, and maybe also his claustrophobic thoughts.

He turned a corner and a flock of pigeons clapped into the air with a sudden noise that made him jump. 

This particular alley was blessedly empty of people and he was a few steps into it, admiring the flowers spilling over the balconies when something he'd subconsciously registered as he turned off the main route pushed its way into the front of his mind. A figure leaning in the shadow of a building as he'd turned the corner.

Alex swung round, but there was nobody there. He stared stupidly at the empty expanse of wall. Jumping at shadows, how pathetic was that? But for a second, he'd been so sure...he turned back the way he'd been going and nearly jumped out of his skin for the second time in a minute because there was someone standing in front of him.

He stared, momentarily speechless. "It _was_ you," he managed finally. 

Yassen gave a slight smile. "I'm impressed. I didn't think you'd seen me at all at first."

Alex felt a smile spreading over his own face. Of all the things he'd been worrying about, he could put one of them to bed. Yassen was alive, and apparently in one piece.

"How did you find me?" he asked, because this could hardly be a coincidence. 

Yassen cocked his head. "Mobile phone. They're dangerous things, you know."

"It's not even in my name."

Yassen just smiled, and Alex could help it, he laughed. 

"It's good to see you," Alex said awkwardly, feeling somehow ridiculously tongue-tied. He'd spent weeks thinking about what he'd say when he saw Yassen again, but now he was here none of it seemed suitable. 

"You too." Yassen gave him an enquiring look. "Are you here working, or shouldn't I ask?"

"Oh. No." Alex shook his head, realising Yassen didn't know what had happened. Why should he? Alex just somehow automatically assumed he would know everything. "I'm just - on holiday."

Yassen nodded, although he still looked curious and Alex wondered how long Yassen had been following him. He had to admit, being here alone and looking miserable hardly backed up the holiday story. Did Yassen think he was lying? 

Alex gave a heavy sigh, and Yassen frowned. "Is everything alright?"

"Not really."

"Want to tell me about it?" 

Alex gave him a helpless smile, and nodded. 

"Come on then." Yassen turned to walk further up the alley. "I have somewhere we can go."

Alex followed him down several more narrow backstreets until they arrived at a door set into an otherwise blank wall. Inside a flight of steps took them into a tall house built around an internal courtyard garden with a fountain playing. From the upper floors it had a spectacular view out over the bay and Alex stared out of the window, captivated.

"Is this yours?" Alex asked. Yassen seemed to have very good taste in houses.

"Only rented. But mine for the moment. No one will disturb us."

"I'm staying in a hotel," Alex said. “By the docks.” 

"You can come and stay here, if you want," Yassen offered carefully and Alex felt his heart speed up a little. He'd been afraid Yassen was only passing through, checking in with him only because he'd promised to, but instead he was offering - what, exactly? A resumption of their earlier companionship? 

"I'd like that," Alex said, and wondered if he'd imagined the fact Yassen looked pleased. 

"So - how are things?" Yassen prompted, as they settled into a pair of cane chairs. "Did you get into trouble when you went back?"

"You could say that. They fired me."

"What?" Yassen looked up, startled. "Shit."

"Yeah." Alex sighed, stretching out his legs in front of him and giving Yassen a rueful smile. "They knew I'd been with you. They wanted me to help bring you in. And I - refused."

Yassen closed his eyes. "I'm sorry. I seem to have been screwing your life up since before you were born."

Alex half-laughed. "It's not your fault. It was my choice. The world's just stupid, that's all. They said they couldn't trust me, because I told them the truth. If I'd lied, it would have meant by definition they couldn't trust me, but I'd still have a job. It's all crap."

"The world's never been fair Alex," Yassen pointed out. 

“Anyway, never mind me, how have you been?” Alex prompted, quickly changing the subject. 

“Oh, you know,” said Yassen vaguely. “Keeping busy.”

“How are you coping?” Alex asked quietly. Physically Yassen was looking good, almost back to how Alex remembered him if you ignored the new scars, but there was still a look in his eyes that made Alex want to hug him. “Are you still having the flashbacks?”

Yassen got up and paced across the room to stare out of the window. “Occasionally,” he admitted. “Only once when it mattered. You learn what to avoid.” 

Alex couldn’t stand it, he followed him over and to Yassen’s surprise wrapped his arms tightly around him. After a second Yassen hesitantly reciprocated, and when Alex didn’t pull away, hugged him back. They stood there for some time, just holding on to each other. 

“Alex?” Yassen murmured eventually. 

Alex looked up, blinking as if he’d been far away. Stepped back. “Sorry.” 

Yassen gave a slight shake of the head. “Don’t be.” He opened his mouth, hesitated, closed it again. Tried a second time. “Alex – I have to ask. “Why did you kiss me? In Avignon?”

“You’d just ditched me at a random airport.” Alex blushed faintly, then smiled. “It was that or slap you.”

“Oh. Well, I guess I’ll take it.”

They studied each other, neither moving any further away. Alex had worried that Yassen would be angry with him for the kiss, or simply uninterested, but the look he was giving Alex right now was as searching as his own.

“Really close to slapping you right now in fact,” Alex murmured, taking a gamble.

Yassen half smiled. “Hard?” 

Alex leaned in, Yassen mirroring the movement automatically. They were so close now Alex could feel the warmth of Yassen’s skin against his cheek.

“Really – really – hard,” Alex breathed. 

Somehow they closed the final gap, a brush of lips that made Alex shiver. 

The lightest of exploratory kisses became another, and then another, gaining intensity with every second. Finally Yassen pulled Alex against him and kissed him deeply, Alex moaning into his mouth.

“Take me to bed?” Alex whispered, after they’d been kissing greedily for some while. They were pressed close enough against each other by now to leave no room for doubt that Yassen wanted this as much as he did.

Yassen gave a huff of laughter. “You don’t waste any time.”

Alex shook his head. “I’ve let too many things slip through my fingers. I’ve learnt not to waste opportunities. I’d rather deal with the fall-out from something than regret not doing it at all.”

Yassen smiled, but he still made no further move and Alex had a moment of uncertainty after all.

“I mean – unless you don’t want to?” He started to pull away, but Yassen drew him back and kissed him.

“Of course I do,” he assured him. “It’s just – it’s been a while,” he admitted awkwardly. “A long while. Since I was with anyone like that.” 

“I’m sorry.” Alex was stricken. “I’m going too fast. We don’t have to, at all.”

“No, I want to,” Yassen promised, and then kissed him again with an intensity that made Alex hot all over. 

“I have heard it’s like riding a bike,” Alex smiled against his mouth. “I don’t think it’s something you really forget how to do.”

In the bedroom though, it was Alex’s turn to hesitate. He was next to Yassen on the bed, both of them half-undressed already, when he paused with his hands on the hem of his t-shirt. Yassen noticed his reluctance and looked at him enquiringly, given that Alex’s trousers had long gone. 

“I don’t think you’ve ever seen me with my shirt off,” Alex said finally. “It’s not pretty.”

Yassen looked down at his own body with its extensive map of scars, and back up at Alex. “You think it will bother me?” he asked quietly. 

Alex shook his head tightly, but he still looked self-conscious and Yassen drew him closer and lifted the shirt off himself, folding Alex into his arms and kissing his shoulders.

The feeling of Yassen’s warm hands stroking so gently over his scarred back almost made him tear up. Yassen cupped Alex’s face between his hands and looked at him seriously. “I can quite honestly say,” Yassen whispered, “that you are the best thing I have ever laid eyes on.”

Alex let his own fingers trace the marks on Yassen’s skin, pressing his lips reverently to each one in turn, wanting Yassen to be sure that he, too, found nothing there to disgust him.

They might have fallen into bed together recklessly fast, but neither was rushing now. They took their time to discover each other, slow kisses and caresses that gradually built into a shared need for more.

Alex wished he had a condom on him, and wondered if Yassen did. By this point he wouldn’t have objected even if Yassen hadn’t mentioned it, but at the point it became obvious that hands and mouths weren’t going to be enough for either of them, it turned out Yassen had both condoms and lube within reach. 

“You’re very well prepared for a man who’s not been having regular sex,” Alex teased. Yassen just smiled but Alex abruptly caught on. “Oh my God, you bought all this for me?”

“Like you said, I like to be prepared.” Yassen flicked him on the nose with a condom packet. “I might have been wrong about your intentions, but if I was right – well. Although I confess I wasn’t expecting to need them this quickly.”

Alex gave him an embarrassed grin. “What can I say? I’ve spent the last two months thinking about this. I’m ready.” He caught Yassen’s expression and snickered. “Have you?”

“Possibly,” Yassen admitted. He’d been afraid he’d been building hopes on a gesture he’d simply misunderstood, but it hadn’t stopped him thinking about it. “You were – the thing I held on to,” he added. “When things were bad.”

Alex folded Yassen into his arms and hugged him tightly. “I’m glad,” he whispered. “I was afraid you wouldn’t be interested in me.”

Yassen had spent most of the same period wondering what Alex could possibly see in him, although he supposed it shouldn’t come as a surprise that neither of them were particularly conventional. 

“Alex, would you...?” he put the condom in Alex’s hand, and gave him a look that nearly had Alex coming on the spot.

“You want _me_ to?” Alex squeaked, taken aback but entirely willing. He’d expected Yassen to want to be fully in control, and the thought he not only wanted but trusted Alex to make love to him was dizzying.

“Only if you would like that?”

“Oh, fuck yes,” Alex breathed. Yassen laughed, low and throaty and Alex kissed him hard, bearing him down to the bed.

It was hot and slow and ultimately cathartic. By the time they’d exhausted themselves the sun was going down, throwing a golden glow over the bed and the rumpled sheets, and the two men lying next to each other, sated and sleepy, exchanging smiles as often as kisses as if neither of them could still quite believe this was real.

Alex found himself wondering how long they could stay here together like this, how soon Yassen would need to move on. He broached the subject hesitantly, not wanting to risk spoiling the moment but needing to know how long they had. Was this forever, or only for a few days? He would take whatever Yassen could offer him, but he needed to know. 

“When you were gone,” he ventured. “Did you do what you needed to? I mean – is it over?”

Yassen nodded slowly. “Yes. The people concerned will no longer be a problem, to either of us. Nor, I think, will the organisation as a whole.”

Alex looked at him, relieved but also wondering how many people he’d killed, and why he wasn’t more bothered by the thought of it. He was only concerned what effect it might have had on Yassen. Had he lost himself in that swelling rage he’d described?

Yassen caught him looking. “You’re going to tell me systematic murder is an unhealthy coping mechanism aren’t you,” he said, sounding mildly amused. “I can see it in your face.”

“Do you feel better for it?” Alex asked neutrally.

Yassen considered. The past few weeks had been full of pain and blood and pleading. But, and he felt this was the important point, not his. 

“I don’t feel _worse_ ,” he said finally. 

Alex sighed and laid his head on Yassen’s chest. After a moment Yassen started stroking his hair. 

“When I was in that place,” Yassen murmured. “I used to think if I ever got out, I would take them all down and probably die trying. That I wouldn’t care enough any longer to keep myself safe. That I wouldn’t want to carry on, if that meant forever remembering what they’d done to me.”

Alex looked up, and Yassen stroked his cheek. “But it was the thought of you,” he said. “It kept me going. That kept me from just – giving in and walking into the path of a bullet. I didn’t even know what it meant, that kiss, if you were just – I don’t know. I didn’t know. But I knew I needed to see you again. That I had to find out.”

Alex leaned up and kissed him softly. “I don’t know exactly when I realised how much you meant to me,” he said. “But you do.” 

Yassen smiled. “You know being with me is probably a terrible idea, right?” 

“Should fit right in with my life choices up to now then,” Alex said, and Yassen sighed. 

“We can do something about that, I think,” he said slowly.

“What do you mean?”

“Would you like your job back?”

Alex stared, and Yassen nodded. “There’s a way. You could do it.”

“What are you talking about? The only way they’d even consider it is if I gave them you, and that’s not happening.”

Yassen took his hand, kissed his knuckles. “What if I came back with you? Voluntarily?”

Alex sat up and stared at him. “They’d – they’d kill you. Or lock you up at least. Do you want that?”

“Do you think they would?” Yassen shook his head slightly. “I’m not so sure. I could be of use to them. They would see that.”

“They’d never trust you. It’s too risky.”

“You gave me my life back Alex. I’d like to do the same for you. If you’ll let me. I want to give you something, if only so I don’t feel so selfish.”

Alex frowned. “Why would you feel selfish?” Yassen didn’t answer, and Alex kissed him. “Talk to me,” he insisted, his lips brushing Yassen’s mouth with each word. 

Yassen sighed, and Alex settled back, reaching for his hand again and interlacing their fingers. Patient, but pointedly expectant. 

“It’s like there’s this - darkness,” Yassen began uncertainly. “Just waiting for me. And it would be so easy to let myself go, to fall into it.” He looked down at their hands, squeezed Alex’s fingers. “You’re the only thing that keeps me holding on. The only thing to hold on _for_. I’m not a good man Alex. I’ve done terrible things. I’ve done them _recently_.”

“I don’t care.”

“You should care!” Yassen stared at him, pained. “This is what I mean. Being with me would not be good for you Alex, and I know that perfectly well. But you’re the only good thing in my life, and as long as you want me then I will not willingly give you up. Because I want you. Because I _need_ you. And that – is selfish.” 

“Love _is_ selfish.” 

The words were out before he’d even thought them through, but Alex knew it was true. He did love Yassen, in a way that almost hurt. 

Yassen stared at him, and Alex gave him a shaky smile and then somehow they were kissing each other, harder than before, almost desperately.

When they finally stopped they lay together, wrapped in each other, as close as they could get.

“Alex – ” 

“Shh.” Alex drew pattens with his fingers across Yassen’s shoulder. “Maybe I’ll be good for you, did you think about that?”

Yassen gave a quiet laugh. “It’s possible.” He pressed a kiss into Alex’s hair. 

After a while Alex sighed. “You’re right, aren’t you?”

Yassen smiled. “I’m going to say yes on principle but I don’t actually know what you’re talking about, so...”

“MI6. They might have spent years claiming you’re the devil incarnate but they are absolutely going to be willing to use you the minute they think you’d work for them instead.”

“Almost certainly.”

“It’s still a risk.”

“Will you come and visit me in prison?”

Alex slapped him. “The only question is whether they’d trust you.”

“Perhaps the question is more do they still trust you? And if so would they believe we trusted each other?”

Alex looked at him. “Christ, you’re suggesting I become your handler?”

Yassen smirked. “Well I’m certainly not going to object to you handling me.” 

This resulted in another tussle, and more kissing. 

Afterwards Alex lay back, considering. “I think perhaps they do. Trust me, I mean. I was so pissed off they fired me, but thinking objectively? I think if I’d been any other agent I’d have been banged up immediately. Properly interrogated, at least. They believed me when I said all I did was help you. They believed that I hadn’t sold them out. It didn’t feel like it at the time, but the fact I’m here at all says they did. Yeah, okay, they might agree to it.” 

“So you want to try?”

“You’d really risk it?”

“For you, I would risk anything.”

Alex smiled. “You’re just trying to get into my pants.”

Yassen slid an appreciative hand over his backside. “Already there. Do we tell them about this? Us?”

“Do you think we should? I’m not sure they’ll exactly like it.” 

“On the other hand they’ll like it less if we hide anything from them they find out later. They’re already going to be suspicious of my motives if I suddenly offer to change my allegiance. It does at least give them an understandable reason for it. Unless – you would prefer nobody knows about this?” Yassen added with a sudden note of uncertainty in his voice that made Alex immediately climb on top on him and kiss him breathless.

“I don’t mind who knows,” Alex promised, settling against him comfortably. “I’m yours.”

“So we’re agreed then? We give it a shot?” Yassen prompted, holding him close.

Alex nodded, then looked up and grinned. “Where there’s life there’s hope, right?”

–


End file.
